Lovely Girl   +  writing

My Writing Resolution for 2008

All the "cool kids" are doing it, so now it's my turn to post my New Year's resolution. I get overwhelmed by long, multi-pronged resolutions, so next year I vow to...

Focus on the big picture.

Of course, what this really means is “don’t sweat the small stuff,” but I’d rather frame it in a more positive light, to concentrate on something actionable, rather than feeling guilty for being the detail-crazy person that I am.

The past year has been pretty good to me. I’ve gotten in the groove with this blog. I’ve found a day job that lets me apply my writing and blogging skills. I’ve churned out a ridiculous number of queries and broken into several big writing markets (in fact, almost exactly a year before I published my essay in the Boston Globe, I wrote about that as a personal goal – behold the power of blogging!).

Now it's time to focus my efforts on a few key markets, rather than going after them all, and to evaluate how I'm spending my time (does a 500 word short really require 5 hours of research? probably not). Hopefully this will increase my hourly rate, so I can earn more money without sacrificing my personal time. I also want to work on being a marathoner instead of a sprinter and maybe even spend some time on that novel floating around in my head.

For more writer's resolutions, check out these blogs:
Inkthinker: What Can You Do to Improve Your Business in 2008?
CatalystBlogger: My Business Resolutions for 2008
Freelance Switch: How to Apply What You Learned in 2007 for Continued Success in 2008
Writing the Cyber Highway: My Top 10 Goals for 2008

Happy holidays!